CASH anxious over deal with Barito

CASH anxious over deal with Barito

KUALA LUMPUR (AFP): Malaysia's Construction and Supplies House
Bhd. (CASH) will decide within a week or two whether to submit
fresh proposals to authorities here for a timber alliance with
Indonesia's PT Barito Pacific Timber, company officials said.

Anxious over the long waiting period for Malaysia's Securities
Commission to approve its revised bid submitted in December, CASH
managing director Joseph Ambrose Lee said it was time for the
next course of action.

"We did not anticipate the long waiting period," Lee was
quoted by Bernama news agency as saying late Saturday after a
shareholders meeting in Labuan, off Malaysia's eastern Sabah
state.

CASH had expressed optimism in December over its revised
proposal with Barito and there was speculation the deal would be
approved by the commission by the first quarter of this year.

The deal, involving a scaled-down proposal for a reverse
takeover of CASH by Barito, was expected to involve the exchange
of timber assets and shares worth 1.7 billion ringgit (680,000
million dollars), CASH company officials had said.

Under the new proposal, Barito head Prajogo Pangestu was
expected to end up with just over 50 percent of CASH.

Company officials had said the Indonesian tycoon had "more or
less agreed" to the revised deal, but Malaysian and Indonesian
authorities would have the final say.

The revised proposal was made after an earlier bid involving a
2. 5-billion- ringgit deal failed.

The first proposal rejected earlier last year would have given
Barito a 70-percent stake in CASH, making that firm the largest
timber player in the Kuala Lumpur Stock Exchange.

That idea was axed by Malaysia's Securities Commission in
June. Analysts had said the rejection reflected Malaysia's unease
over such a large foreign stake in a local listed company.
CASH share price closed eight sen higher at 4.38 ringgit Friday.